The Trump administration on Friday deported a Laotian national whose Minnesota conviction for repeatedly sexually assaulting a 10-year-old girl was later pardoned, removing him from the United States one month after Minnesota's Board of Pardons erased the conviction that had made him deportable.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio terminated Vang's legal status, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement carried out the removal within hours.

Vang, 42, was convicted in 2006 of first-degree criminal sexual conduct for assaults on a girl between 2002 and 2004, beginning when she was 10.

The conviction was pardoned by Minnesota's Board of Pardons on June 10. An immigration judge issued a final order of removal on Oct. 31, 2006, according to the Department of Homeland Security.

According to investigators, Vang once offered the child $10 to keep quiet and described the abuse as "a cultural thing."

The case became a political flashpoint after the three-member Minnesota Board of Pardons unanimously granted Vang a pardon. The board consists of Gov. Tim Walz, a Democrat; Attorney General Keith Ellison, a Democrat; and Minnesota Supreme Court Chief Justice Natalie Hudson.

The board said the victim's letter supporting clemency was decisive.

Under federal immigration law, a state pardon can extinguish the underlying conviction that triggers removal.

Ellison's office argued that the pardon nonetheless did not shield Vang because the Trump administration could refuse to restore his green card and restart proceedings, a position his office reiterated in a statement after Friday's removal.

That is the mechanism Rubio invoked.

"Because of our action, this foreign criminal will never pose a threat to any American ever again," Rubio said.

DHS acting Assistant Secretary Lauren Bis said in a statement that Walz "pardoned this sex criminal in an attempt to allow him to remain in our country."

Vang's path back into ICE custody had been contested.

ICE detained him Dec. 10, 2025, during Operation Metro Surge, but a federal judge ordered his release on Feb. 19, writing that the government "detained the petitioner first, and asked questions later."

The pardon followed in June. Rubio's revocation of Vang's status cleared the last obstacle.

Ellison's office said the board had denied pardons to three other men convicted of sex crimes who are facing deportation.

In a July 1 post on X, House Majority Whip Tom Emmer, R-Minn., called the pardon another action by "our feckless governor that puts violent illegal aliens ahead of innocent Americans."

Vang, admitted to the U.S. as a refugee in 1994 under the Clinton administration, was returned to Laos.